Assertiveness training teaches a subset of social skills to enable people to become more assertive. In learning how to better express both positive and negative feelings, to refuse inappropriate social pressure, to become more skilled in negotiating conversational exchanges and to learn to make appropriate social demands, individuals can build self esteem, self confidence.

A popular technique advocated by assertiveness experts is the Broken record technique.[How to reference and link to summary or text] This consists of simply repeating your requests every time you are met with illegitimate resistance. The term comes from vinyl records, the surface of which when scratched would lead the needle of a record player to loop over the same few seconds of the recording indefinitely. However, a disadvantage with this technique is that when resistance continues, your requests lose power every time you have to repeat them. If the requests are repeated too often it can backfire on the authority of your words. In these cases it is necessary to have some sanctions on hand.

Another technique some suggest is called Fogging, which consists of finding some limited truth to agree with in what an antagonist is saying.[How to reference and link to summary or text] More specifically, one can agree in part or agree in principle.